'The political is personal': How Palestinian history and identity are stitched into garments

8 July 2023

Both medium and message, the traditional embroidery technique tatreez has long been an expression of resistance

8 July 2023

Everyday dress from Gaza or Hebron, 1935-1940, from the collection of Tiraz: Widad Kawar Home for Arab Dress

A group sits in a circle; their eyes transfixed as they slowly embroider. Each tiny stitch is the work of nimble fingers. The motif of a cypress tree symbolises resilience. A pomegranate anticipates abundance and prosperity. An orange blossom, grape or leech suggests a different Palestinian village or region. With needle and thread, women create tatreez (traditional embroidery patterns typically cross-stitched onto dresses and headdresses). In every seam and tack, they join an age-old tradition of Palestinian women who have infused domestic art with social commentary. To invert a feminist slogan, the political is personal.

Different colours, symbols and patterns are used to tell the story of Palestine and its fragmented people. Native plants such as madder and pomegranate skins provide the trademark red. Indigo is used to create shades of blue. Sumac leaves make a yellow-green dye, while grape leaves make yellow and walnut shells make black. Young women in Hebron traditionally wore green, whereas older women wore purple. In the liberal-intellectual hub of Ramallah, a bright red shade of thread was common.

Maeve Brennan, still from film The Embroiderers, 2016

Polaroid, 1973, from the archive of Inaash Al-Mukhayim, courtesy of INAASH
Polaroid, 1973, from the archive of Inaash Al-Mukhayim, courtesy of INAASH

Frequently used to embellish ankle-length robes known as thobes, tatreez also marks important milestones in a person’s life: a wedding, pregnancy, or even the death of a spouse. In some villages, widowhood is marked by stitching over the hallmark red thread or dyeing the embroidered panels in blue. In this way, the embroidery documents the life of the person wearing it; a thread that connects individual and collective identity.

Despite a history dating back 3,000 years, the tradition has taken on renewed significance. A landmark exhibition at Kettle’s Yard, Material Power: Palestinian Embroidery, brings the subject into focus, exploring the art form as an expression of resistance and a means of preserving Palestinian history. Curated by Rachel Dedman, the show displays more than 40 embroidered objects, loaned from important collections in Jordan and the occupied West Bank. Contemporary works by artists Aya Haidar, Mona Hatoum, Khalil Rabah, Mounira Al Solh, and Majd Abdel-Hamid interact with rarely seen archival material and historical objects.

Dress from Ramallah, 1930s, from the collection of Maha Abu Shosheh
Jellayeh from Hebron, 1900-1915, from the collection of Dar Al-Tifel Al-Arabi Museum for Palestinian Heritage

Throughout the show, Palestinian history is charted. An embroidered dress (originally from 1930s Ramallah) recounts the Nakba (Arabic for ‘catastrophe’) which refers to the destruction of the Palestinian homeland and mass displacement of Palestinian Arabs in 1948. The dress was donated by its maker to a woman who fled her home during the Nakba and entered the West Bank as a refugee. It has been made to fit its new owner’s size by using the material of United Nations Relief and Works Agency flour sacks.

Another exhibition highlight is the Intifada Dress which recalls the first intifada (Arabic for ‘shaking off’), between 1987 and 1993. During the uprising many Palestinians were under curfew and forced to stay at home. People would stitch the Palestinian flag, along with doves and guns, onto their clothing. By acting as both a medium and a message, Intifada dresses made women's bodies places of political resistance. Embroidering these symbols directly onto cloth made them more difficult to seize than placards or banners.

In 2019, US Democrat Rashida Tlaib wore a traditional Palestinian thobe adorned with tatreez when she was sworn into Congress. Recalling her American-Palestinian childhood for ELLE magazine, she wrote: ‘I watched my mother hand-stitch thobes while sitting on the floor with a lamp at her side. She wants all of her children to succeed, but without giving up on our roots and culture.’ By wearing tatreez, Tlaib sought to summon her Palestinian 'ancestors and community' to the corridors of American power. The hashtag #tweetyourthobe celebrated the moment, but online detractors reacted with accusations of antisemitism and Islamophobic slurs, some even branding her a terrorist.

Mona Hatoum, Untitled (hair grid with knots), 2001. Human hair, hair spray and tracing paper. Courtesy White Cube (Photo: Hugo Glendinning)
Aya Haidar, Bedtime from the Safe Space series, 2023, embroidery on cotton

For diasporic communities (which constitute around half of all Palestinians living outside historic Palestine), holding on to symbols or learning ancient indigenous crafts is crucial for reconnecting with their heritage. More recognisable Palestinian symbols, like the keffiyeh scarf and flag, can get people in trouble with the Israeli and German authorities. In contrast, the folkloristic, esoteric, and earthy tatreez is the subtlest of the three visual symbols of Palestinian nationhood, and less familiar outside the community.

At the Kettle’s Yard exhibition, another highlight is a 1930s dress from Gaza. Embroidered patches and darns speak of the wearer’s work in the fields, while holes on the chest indicate she is breastfeeding. It is a multigenerational mosaic, bearing traces of garments inherited from the wearer’s mother or grandmother. It also reflects how embroidery skills are passed down within communities. Elders share tatreez technique and patterns from generation to generation. Young girls might begin learning these skills at the age of six. Sewing sessions are a place for bonding, for conversations between grandmothers and granddaughters, and even a place to make marriage arrangements. In this way, tatreez is at the heart of the private inner world of Palestinians, especially women.

Maeve Brennan, still from The Embroiderers, 2016

Although tatreez embroidery is often carried out by women, it has also been an outlet for Palestinian male detainees in Israeli prisons – a silk, textile, and cardboard handbag designed by Karam Maloukh in 2008 is on display. The art of embroidery and other crafts is often prohibited in prisons, but men use it to express themselves and to give gifts to their loved ones despite this. The bag is part of a selection of embroidered objects – prayer beads, a books, and pen – made by prisoners with the tools at their disposal, such as threads from their own clothing, dye from medicines, and cardboard from cereal cartons.

‘Material Power: Palestinian Embroidery’ , Kettle’s Yard, 8 July – 29 October

'The political is personal': How Palestinian history and identity are stitched into garments

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